Okay, it was a planned day of hooky, but still fun. I have to work all weekend, and today was supposed to be perfect fall weather, so I decided to take a day off. Although it wasn't intentional, it kind of turned into an experiment - will anything make Meg tired?

After sleeping in for a bit (7:30, sadly, is sleeping in), we went for a 20 minute bike ride, then stopped at the park for some serious "puppy fits". She did sleep in the car for a couple of hours around lunchtime while I rode my horse and played with him.

Then, off to the reservior to enjoy the weather! It is only a couple minutes from my house, and a wonderful place to walk dogs.

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Clearly, it's time to get Meg some orange clothes. She blends in quite nicely with the autumn woods.

This little guy hoped right across my path as we were walking - fortunately, the great hunter was busy somewhere else. How cute is he?

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I mentioned before that I wanted to teach Meg to fetch. She had zero interest in toys when I got her, and no natural retrieve. With a couple weeks work, she's turning into a champion fetcher! So, we went to the green to play ball for a while.

What did you do with Meg to get her to be a champion fetcher? Sawyer has a huge problem with actually bringing the ball back to me...it's more like "Well, if you wanted it back, you shouldn't have thrown it away..it's mine now!"

The only time he did great retrieves is when he was trying to show up the Lab next door at the lake.

Thanks, guys. We had such a fun day! Now I have my regular day off on Monday, and the perfect weather is going to continue. Unfortunately for Meg, I feel guilty that I spent so much of Friday with her, so Monday is all about Tristan, the horse. Poor guy was an only child and got hours of loving a day until Meg came along.

What did you do with Meg to get her to be a champion fetcher?

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Lots of work with the clicker and some really good treats. Her issue was that she didn't ever want to pick the ball up. She would always chase it, and maybe bat it around a bit with her front paws, but never seemed to put her mouth on it. I got her picking it up inside by clicking any time she hit it with her nose. She started putting it in her mouth pretty quickly.

Her second issue was that she would chase, pick it up...and then drop it as soon as I called her and come tearing over . I just kept pointing at the ball, telling her to get it, until she would pick it up again. Luckily with Meg, if I can get one really good response and jackpot it, she tends to "get it". I finally got her to bring it all the way, and since than, she's been wonderful. I finally got to start using my Chuck-It .